Japan and Korea are two hours apart by air, both have rail networks that make a car pointless, and they are different enough from each other that combining them is a genuinely varied trip rather than a repetition.
Most visitors do one and not the other, and Korea is the one that gets skipped — which is why it is a fraction as crowded for a comparable standard of food, transport and history.
Three weeks, split
Twelve days in Japan, nine in Korea, or the reverse. Fly between them — Fukuoka to Busan, or Tokyo/Osaka to Seoul — on one of the many cheap short-haul services. There is also a ferry from Fukuoka to Busan, which takes about three hours by hydrofoil and is a pleasant alternative.
Japan: the route
Tokyo, 4 nights. Plan by district, not by attraction.
Hakone or Nikkō, 1 night. Hot springs and Fuji, or the shrine complex in cedar forest.
Kanazawa, 2 nights. Kenroku-en garden, a samurai district, two geisha districts, and far fewer visitors than Kyoto.
Kyoto, 4 nights. Early mornings, and the temples that are not on every list. Day trips to Nara and Osaka.
Hiroshima and Miyajima, 1 night. The Peace Memorial Museum, and the torii in the sea.
Fukuoka, 1 night, for the yatai street-food stalls and to fly or sail to Korea.
Korea: the route
Busan, 3 nights. Korea’s second city and its port: Jagalchi fish market, the Gamcheon hillside village painted in blocks of colour, temples on the cliffs at Haedong Yonggungsa, and beaches in the middle of the city.
Gyeongju, 2 nights. The capital of the Silla kingdom for a thousand years, and effectively an open-air museum — royal burial mounds in the middle of town, Bulguksa temple, and the Seokguram grotto Buddha. Almost no foreign visitors.
Andong or Jeonju, 1 night. Hanok villages of traditional wooden houses; Jeonju is also where bibimbap comes from and takes the claim seriously.
Seoul, 3 nights. Five royal palaces, the best of them Changdeokgung with its Secret Garden; Bukchon’s hanok streets; Gwangjang market for food; the DMZ as a day trip, which requires booking and a passport; and a night out in Hongdae or Euljiro, which is among the better nights out anywhere.
Rail
Japan. The JR Pass rose sharply in price in 2023 and is no longer automatic. For the route above it is probably still worth it; do the arithmetic against individual fares. Regional passes are frequently better value. Reserve Shinkansen seats — free with a pass — and note the fastest Nozomi services carry a supplement.
Korea. The KTX does Seoul to Busan in under three hours. The Korail Pass exists for foreign visitors and is worth it only for a lot of long-distance travel; individual tickets are cheap. Buy through the Korail app or at the station.
Both countries use contactless transport cards — Suica/Pasmo in Japan, T-money in Korea — that work on subways, buses and in convenience stores nationwide.
Luggage forwarding in Japan sends your bag ahead overnight for a small fee, and it is one of the best things about travelling there.
How the two differ
Pace. Japan is orderly and quiet; Korea is faster, louder and more direct. Neither is better and the contrast is the point of doing both.
Food. Japan’s is precise and often single-focus — one restaurant, one dish, done for decades. Korea’s is communal, spicy, and arrives in a dozen small dishes nobody ordered. Korean barbecue and Japanese izakaya serve similar social functions.
Cost. Korea is cheaper across accommodation, food and transport. Japan is better value than its reputation and a weak yen has helped.
Language. Japanese uses three scripts; Korean uses Hangul, an alphabet designed in the fifteenth century to be learnable in a morning, and it genuinely is. Learning to read it in two hours transforms navigating the country.
English. More widely spoken in Korean cities than in rural Japan, and less so in the Korean countryside.
Seasons
Late March to May and October to November are the right months in both, with cherry blossom moving north through both countries in spring and autumn colour moving south.
Summer is hot and very humid in both, with Japan’s rainy season in June and typhoons from August.
Winter is cold, and it is skiing season in Japan’s north and the quietest time in Korea.
Avoid: Japan’s Golden Week in late April, Obon in mid-August, and Korea’s Chuseok and Seollal, when the entire country travels and nothing is bookable.
Practical
Cash matters more in Japan than you expect. Korea is close to cashless.
Pocket wifi or an eSIM in both; Japan in particular has patchy free public wifi.
Convenience stores in both countries are genuinely good and are where a lot of breakfast happens.
Tattoos still bar entry to many Japanese onsen and some Korean jjimjilbang. Check before turning up.